Official Windows Phone Central app v3.0 is now available!

You may have noticed a lot of changes around here lately, whether it be our desktop and mobile websites, or on our forums, we’ve been rather busy. Of course, not to be outdone by all this change, it’s time for our app to see an update, and it’s a fairly major one at that.

So I present to you, the official Windows Phone Central app version 3.0, and the product of months and months of hard work, testing, private betas, and then lots more hard work!

The update is available to download right now from the Windows Phone Store here, but if you want to find out what’s new, read on for a feature list. Video walkthrough will follow in a future article, so stay tuned.

Our headline feature this time around, and one that with no doubt has been the most frequently requested, is full forum integration. Swipe over to the browse section and tap the forum tile and you’ll be welcomed to the new forum home screen (you could also tap and hold the forum tile if you want the option to pin it directly to your start screen - see above photo).

We’ve built this forum support from the ground up, based on the Tapatalk API and you’ll find support for:

Posting and editing entries

Browsing the forums including sub forums

Quick jumping around the forums (just tap the header when you’re browsing)

Viewing photos attached to posts

Following links posted by other members

Viewing profile information about users (just tap their tile when viewing a thread)

Sending and receiving private messages

Deep linking to forum posts from articles and vice versa

Viewing recently participated and latest posts from the home screen

Searching for a post within the forums

We’ve also made a few other changes you might appreciate:

A new live tile to match the new site logo (rolling out soon to the website - this is a preview)

New wallpapers featuring our new logo (available in 20 accent colors)

Customisable themes for the app and live tile (try out a new Windows Phone 8 colour!)

Improved YouTube video support with HD streaming even on mobile connections

Rebranded with the new site logo

Adjusted margins to bring more content to the front

Added jump options to the comments section

Fixed a multitude of bugs

Made several optimisations to the app

Reduced the app’s installed footprint to less than 1MB

I’m quite sure I’ve forgotten something from that list but hopefully it’s enough of a change to make you interested! We’ve also made all forum functionality available to free users, you guys will just see the same adverts you’re used to.

Without a doubt this has been a very challenging few months for me but I hope you’ll all feel it has been worth it! Of course, we always welcome your feedback in any form, so please comment, e-mail, post on the forums and generally get in touch!

Reader comments

Official Windows Phone Central app v3.0 is now available!

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Note: WPC refer to my entry at November 1, 2012, 2:20am under the WP8 contest comments! I submitted in the wrong place before hahah! Again great update guys, the accents are a lil slice of WP8 heaven for us future 7.8-ers!

Well, thank you very much for making your app's live tile the only one worth even looking at on my phone. It's in nice olive accent and now I hate you because the rest of my phone's live tiles aren't in olive. Which means I'll be expecting WPCentral to buy me a Lumia 920 right now because I can't wait any longer! :) All because of your gorgeous new live tile, I want that phone on my desk tomorrow... :P
Anyway, great job, love your app, I'm glad I've spent those 8 kn on it (don't know the price in your currency :D)

Playing with the new app right now. It is awesome job, while few things, if could be changed, would make it perfect, one of which is change of text color in comments as the white text do not always work with every accent. I updated the app and first of all changed the accent color to yellow to get some feeling of wp8 but found some difficulty reading comments due to above stated reason. BTW i much like the two finger text zoom, its nice.

Superb update, love the new forums. I like how you swipe to go forward or back a page, but, I'm wondering if it might be 'better' if you could swipe pages before they load and show the page number you will be on. It works fine now, but it just takes 'a while' to navigate to a specific page.

Nice app Jay! Interesting thing though. I can't see the (plus) symbol on the app. Only on the site. Tried to give someone a (plus) one and didn't show. Also I can see where someone else gave a (plus) 1 and I can't see the symbol on the app.

OK Here is another one who is disappointed! I have version 2 on my phone which I obviously paid for. Couldn't there have been an upgrade price instead of the full price? Now everyone pays as if the app is downloaded for the very first time. If there ever will be another update of this otherwise great app could you consider that the download recognises an older version and sets the price accordingly (first time download full price - updates discounted)?

I upgraded from v2 to the awesome new v3 free, like with all apps in the marketplace. I've never had to pay to update a paid app except when I changed my live id associated with my phone and lost all of my app history. :(

Great update with the inclusion of the forums and different accent colors Although the new live tile and forum tile look really odd or unfinished to me. More so the forum tile. I'm gonna miss the old one sliding to the side with the large new article number. But everybody has different taste I guess. Now if it moved around like the people hub tile it would be ok. But app is running buttery smooth. Keep up the good work guys.

Great work Jay! This is one of a few apps I view daily (ok, many times per day). Love the update and new colors!

My only suggestions (and these are the same as my feedback at the last update):
-Make links viewable right from posts (underline them and make them clickable). I hate not knowing where the links are and having to swipe right, hit Links or Download App to follow a link. Bothers me every single day and I miss a lot of links I would otherwise follow.
-Make external links open within the app.

This is a valid request. Often times there are references made in the articles that are only indicated by the linked text within the article. From the app, not knowing that some text in linked sometimes causes confusion.

Shobiz: unfortunately it's on and off, I have to set the WiFi test to be on a different thread because otherwise the app can crash where Windows Phone can take a very long time to determine the connection type.

Just wondering what on and off means? I noticed this also when sitting images to low quality and checked high quality over WiFi... The high quality never showed up unless I selected to always show high quality.